Hat form



y 19380 J. M. BENNINGEZR 2,125,098

HAT FORM Filed May 29, 1937 BY 7 W y ATTORNEY.

Patented July 26, 1938 rrso srrs HAT FORM Application May 29, 1937, Serial No. 145,489

2 Claims.

This invention relates to hat forms, and more particularly to forms employed in the manufacture and blocking of hats. The invention is particularly adaptable to hat forms for hats having portions of the crown directed inwardly requiring the form to be larger than the opening through which it must be retracted.

The objects of the invention are to provide a form which is more readily removed or retracted from the hat after the form has served its purpose; to avoid any unnecessary deformation of the hat while removing the form; to avoid stretching the inturned portion of the hat to remove the form; to enable the form to separate 15 and the parts to be removed individually with contraction of the form becoming effective immediately upon beginning the operation of separating the parts; to provide a form which may be readily adapted to various shapes of hats with 20 equal effectiveness; to minimize the number of parts of the form and enable them to be readily removable; to secure simplicity of construction and operation; and to obtain other advantages and results as may be brought out in the follow- 25 ing description.

Referring to the accompanying drawing in which like numerals of reference indicate similar parts throughout the several views:--

Figure 1 is a plan view of the assembled form;

30 Figure 2 is a vertical sectional view substantially on line 22 of Figure 1; and

Figure 3 is another Vertical sectional View transverse to that of Figure 2 and substantially on line 33 of Fig. 2.

In the specific embodiment of the invention i1- lustrated in said drawing the reference numeral lfi designates the base portion of the form, which in this instance is illustrated as cylindrical with a fiat under surface H for enabling the form to 40 sit upright on a work bench or elsewhere as may be found desirable. The said base has formed integral therewith or attached thereto one member E2 of the hat shaping portion of the form, the said member if being shown as having two 45 side surfaces l3, l3 which are parallel to each other and in a plane normal to the under surface II of the base portion It. Preferably the upper surface 14 of the base portion from which the member l2 projects is likewise normal to the side 50 faces l3, E3 of said member and parallel to the under surface l l. The face l5 of the fixed member I2 is in a plane which slopes with respect to the horizontal parallel surfaces ii and M of the base, the slope being in a direction from the base 55 outwardly to reduce the width of the said member in a diametric direction. In other words the slope is in a direction generally outward with respect to the outer edge or face of the said member.

The form is completed by a plurality of removable members, of which one removable member 56 has a correspondingly sloping face I! to engage the sloping face iii of the fixed member and has parallel side faces l8, ll 8 which, when the removable member E6 is assembled against the 10 fixed member i2, will be in the same plane as the plane faces l3, l3 of the fixed member. The said removable member it which for convenience will be referred to as the intermediate removable member. when assembled with the fixed member 52, will therefore constitute together a diametric segment of the form portion of the block resting on both sides of the assembled segment.

The form is then completed by a pair of similar segments or members l9, l9 having inner plane surfaces 2%, 20 to each engage the plane faces I2 and E8 of the assembled mid section. The outer surfaces of the assembled block are shaped to comprise the desired shape and form for the hat, and the specific shape here illustrated is a bulging pan-cake configuration, although any other desired shape may be substituted. Under the flaring crown portion in this pan-cake configuration, the several members comprising the form are, when assembled shaped to comprise a cylindrical configuration or neck portion 2i with appropriate grooves 22, circumferential around the same for enabling the felt or other material comprising the hat to be tied in as usual. It will be observed that the form is one which provides a circum- 5 ferentia] flare or overhang above and entirely around the neck portion 2i, and it is because of this greater size of the flare to the size of the neck which requires special consideration for enabling the form to be removed from the hat after the hat is shaped or blocked.

The several members it and H] are held assembled during blocking with respect to fixed member l2 by means of dove tail tenons 23, 23 all of which are fast upon the fixed member 12 on the plane surfaces l3, l3 and i5 thereof all of which slope axially parallel with the inner sloping face E5 of the said fixed member. Each of the removable members has corresponding dove tail grooves therein sloping from the lower ends of the members and upon both at the lower ends and plane surfaces of said members.

It will accordingly be now appreciated, that in use of my improved hat form, after a hat is shaped thereon, the base portion may be drawn away from the hat, which immediately results in member l2 moving inward with respect to the hat and other members by virtue of the sloping face l5 and sloping dove tail interconnections. This reduction of the size, effective immediately starting to move the base portion and its attached member [2 forthwith loosens the hat with respect to the form, and the form member l2 will thus be readily withdrawn from the hat Without any undue stretching or deformation of the hat, and member I 6 is then easily grasped and withdrawn, after it the larger segmental members 19, l 9 can be withdrawn one after the other. The fact that the hat is loosened immediately upon starting to move the base and its attached member I2 is exceedingly beneficial in accomplishing the ready and convenient removal of the form from the hat. It is likewise to be observed that the dove tail tenons and sockets have an upward converging taper so as to likewise loosen with the initial movement between the parts, and the operator therefore has no struggle to get the parts separated and thus there is no tendency to injure the hat by pushing on the form members or by other operations which have heretofore been necessary in hat manufacturing to extract the form from the hat.

I claim:

1. A hat form comprising more than two members each having lateral hat-engaging portions adapted to be fitted together to make a complete form for tensioning a hat thereon, two of said members having sloped and engaging surfaces one of which members may be first retracted and thereby enable the form to be reduced in size and the hat-engaging portion of the said first retracted member to immediately retract from its hat tensioning and engaging position immediately upon sliding said first retracted member with the sloped surface with respect to the other member with the sloped surface.

2. A hat form comprising in combination, a base, more than two members each having lateral hat-engaging portions adapted to be fitted together to make the complete form for tensioning a hat thereon, one said member and base being fixed with respect to each other, said fixed member having a surface sloping at an angle with respect to the base, and another of said members having a face correspondingly sloped for engaging the first said face and enabling the members to be disassembled by relative sliding of the base and its member with respect to the other members and thereby immediately retract the fixed member from hat-tensioning position and reduce the effective size of the form.

JOHN M. BENNINGER. 

